Conventionally, efforts in the composites manufacturing industry have been directed toward low cost manufacturing processes such as Liquid Composite Molding (LCM). In a LCM process, a fibrous preform material is placed into a mold, which is then closed and sealed to prevent leakage before a liquid resin is injected into the mold.
One example of an LCM process is Vacuum Assisted Resin Transfer Molding (VARTM). In VARTM, a single-sided mold tool is sealed by enveloping the preform material with a flexible film adhered to the tool surface with a sealant. A vacuum pump is used to draw the resin from a reservoir into the volume formed between the flexible film and the tool surface.
In the VARTM process, variations in the flexible film and base materials often cause problems during the resin infusion, which cause the infusion to be unsuccessful and the partially infused part to be thrown away as scrap. Accordingly, there remains a need to improve the infusion process of LCM.